Features
- Cover Type: Paperback with 256 pages
- Published by: Mariner Books
- Edition: 1st Edition April 6, 2001
- Written in: English
- ISBN 10 Number: 0618127240
- ISBN 13 Number: 978-0618127245
-
Book Dimensions:
8.1 x 5.5 x 0.7 inches
- Weighs: 8.8 ounces
Product Review
After twenty years of living in the "Great American Outback," as
Newsweek magazine once designated the Dakotas, poet Kathleen Norris (
The Cloister Walk) came to understand the fascinating ways that people become metaphors for the land they inhabit. When trying to understand the polarizing contradictions that exist in the Dakotas between "hospitality and insularity, change and inertia, stability and instability. between hope and despair, between open hearts and closed minds," Norris draws a map. "We are at the point of transition between east and west in the United States," she explains, "geographically and psychically isolated from either coast, and unlike either the Midwest or the desert west."
Like Terry Tempest Williams (
Refuge), Norris understands how the boundary between inner and outer scenery begins to blur when one is fully present in the landscape of their lives. As a result, she offers the geography lesson we all longed for in school. This is a poetic, noble, and often funny (see her discussion on the foreign concept of tofu) tribute to Dakota, including its Native Americans, Benedictine monks, ministers and churchgoers, wind-weathered farmers, and all its plain folks who live such complicated and simple lives.
--Gail Hudson
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
Nearly twenty years ago, poet Kathleen Norris and her husband moved from New York to the isolated town of Lemmon in northwestern South Dakota, home of her grandparents. Living there radically changed her sense of time and place, forcing her to come to terms with her heritage, her religious beliefs and the land. Norris learned to value the prairie landscape and to cope with the harsh climate. She found small-town life a mass of contradictions: generous hospitality mixed with suspicion of strangers, inertia and a sense of inferiority. One boon to her new life was a community of Benedictine monks; with them she recaptured her (Protestant) Christian faith and discovered inner peace. This is a fine portrait of the High Plains and its people as well as a very personal memoir of a spiritual awakening.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Reader ReviewsNorris is quite amazing, having overcome the natural fault of looking at the world through her previous pre-conceptions...i.e., a New Yorker who just has toon how different real small town life is. She is one of the few who can actually convey the essence of a small town (and her credibility is strengthened by her fair mention of both pros and cons). My Dad had an uncle who homesteaded in Lemon, SD (where Norris lives) and I spent most summers on my Mom's family's ranch on the James River. Norris helped me understand what all those years were really about. The stark spirituality of her monastic experiences are powerful. This is why the book is not a slow read (as many have commented)....it is a quiet read.....and from that forgotten strength in our busy world, this book is a remarkable refuge. Read this in quiet.....understand small town life on the starkly beautiful great northern plains......and become a better person for the time you give Norris' writing. I predict you will find another small piece to the puzzle of where you fit into the great scheme of things....whether it be your religious beliefs or your sense of history, geography, art, or self....it's in there and she will help you to reach it in her own quiet and mysterious way.
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